Plan B Forum

Up and down the country a small but dedicated bunch of festival-goers are preparing for the biggest date in the summer calendar.

As headliners, the Wurzels can’t really compete with Kanye. But, fortunately, live music isn’t Upton Cheney’s primary draw. The weather doesn’t even matter because a heatwave is guaranteed: this weekend marks the final of the UK Chilli Cook-Off, a hotly contested title, both literally and metaphorically.

But the Upton Cheney Chilli Festival, which takes place near Bristol, isn’t all about cooking. It’s just one event in a summer calendar that sees tens of thousands turn out to celebrate the chilli in all its forms. Stereotype has it that Brits like their food bland, but it seems the nation has gone chilli mad. Chilli shops, saucemakers and farms of varying scales have sprung up all over the place in the past decade, from Devon to Scotland, with some farms making profits of more than £250,000 a year and exporting to the likes of Mexico and Pakistan in deals the Department of the Environment announced to be worth £1.3m to the British economy. According to figures from Euromonitor International, the UK hot sauce market is now worth more than £17m. And the festivals are multiplying – there are at least 10 this month, from Bath to Scotland, culminating with London’s Festival Of Heat on the 27 September. Even if they’re not cooking, chilli heads like to compete, usually by munching on raw peppers of escalating firepower or ingesting superhot sauces (the last one to reach for the milk wins). At one festival I watched a contestant spoon hot sauce from a jar as if it was yoghurt. Most of the people who turn out will be browsing stalls for new and exciting hot sauces, chilli-infused oils and other chilli-based products to take home.

Joe Guy wrote:Only people who require hearing aids can really appreciate The Wurzels.

MajGenl.Meade wrote:They even have a tribute band - The Mangle Wurzles